The Course of Evolution
by Paul596
Summary: Earth Gov's deployed special forces team, callsign Raptor to Goliath station to aid local forces in dealing with cases involving mass murders, suicides and terrorists that are mainly unitologists who are trying to push mankind to the next step of evolution, which involves people dying. Raptor team has to cease the threat, but will soon discover, there is something more to Goliath.
1. Chapter 1

It has been several years since the destruction of the floating colony orbiting Saturn, Titan Station, and all seems to have gone to hell. Almost every colony now a days have a so called marker test lab. Markers are actually the source of all our power, the so called miracle fuel that enables us to have unlimited energy. But it is also believed by unitologists that such a source of power is also a holy relic of some kind in their religion, but hell do they even know of the horror a single marker could cause. They give off this signal that morphs dead flesh into grotesque creatures otherwise known as necromorphs, and they come in various forms. One thing we know though, their intent is to make more "vessels" for other necromorphs to be born, in other words kill and infect.

Unitologists believe that this isn't something to be taken as a bad thing, instead, they have this twisted idea that becoming one of those things is the passage to the cycle of rebirth, the next stage in evolution as they call it. They have taken a lot of drastic measures to aiding necromorphs in securing more "vessels". There have been many cases where people have been brutally murdered, and there seems to be no limitation to victims, even women and children have been slaughtered cruelly. Cases of large groups of people committing suicide in public areas have also occurred, most likely unitologists making vessels out of themselves. Death is all around, murders, suicides, I can't imagine what's next.

My name is Roy Cross, Earth Government Special Forces, holding the rank of First Lieutenant, my team and I have been transferred to Goliath station to aid the local forces. Reports say that there have been multiple cases of mass murders and suicides over the past 3 days, and things are getting out of hand. Earth Gov. deployed my team, otherwise known as Raptor team, and we're about to enter a whole new level of hell.

Raptor team composes of 5 people including myself,

 **Corporal Fred Lansik** , age 25, he used to be E.O.D (Explosive Ordnance Disposal), and has this love and passion to blow things up. Armed with a burst fire machine gun and a under barrel grenade launcher, he's the team grenadier, very good also in dealing with large numbers, and I'm pretty sure we'll need someone to handle crowd control, of course with tear gas grenades and not frags or incendiaries.

 **Sergeant 2nd class Diego Caedo** , age 32, used to be an instructor in close quarters and now he's the team's breacher. Armed with a shotgun with an under barrel mounted force gun, basically anything that comes close would be in for quite a surprise.

 **Private Lars Desmos** , age 20, the new transferee, the rookie of the team armed with a standard assault rifle. He's yet to see actually operations and combat to actually become seasoned to this line of work, but his scores in training were top notch, so there's a chance he'd actually do well.

 **Sergeant 1st class Sarah Guntram** , age 21, Raptor team's second in command, and also my childhood friend. Never thought we'd end up working together especially after we were separated after I hit command school. She's armed with a pair of SMG's and each under mounted with a revolver modification. She's also the team's engineer, so she has a knack for experimenting or constructing new toys for us to play with.

And then there's me, **Lieutenant Roy Cross** , age 23, Raptor team's leader. I carry an old favourite of mine, the triple barrelled pulse rifle, customized to use the same crowd control functionality as the older model, in where you point your rifle to the sky and the 3 barrels will start pointing in different angles and start spraying bullets while the barrel rotates on its own.

The whole team aside from Sarah and I wore the specialized white military armour, while I, being the commander of the team, got access to the latest special forces suit. A bit odd that we're special forces but not everyone is issued a special forces suit. Well anyway, that's Raptor squad for you. Right now, we're in a military class cruiser about 5 minutes out from Goliath station, now proceeding to docking. The whole team preps up for arrival as they get their gear together.

"Nervous rookie?" asked Fred.

"N-not really." said Lars in a somewhat shivery tone.

"Yeah he's nervous. Haha!" laughed Diego. "Have you read the case reports? All bloody and grotesque! Maybe our first assignment would be matching someone's hand to the correct body, if there still is one anyway hahaha!"

"W-what? No way!"

"Relax kid they're just playing with you." Said Sarah. "Just follow our orders and we're all good."

"Yes ma'am..."

"60 seconds to arrival! All troops prepare for arrival!" announced the pilot on the intercoms.

"Alright you heard him!" I said. "Don't leave anything behind!"

"Yes sir!" the team said in unison.

The cruiser then docks into Goliath station's starport and opens its doors as we, and other teams proceed to our rendezvous point for our mission.

"Alright, first things first, link up with local forces, we've been assigned to help investigate in a crime scene." I announced to the team.

"What kind of crime are we looking at here sir?" asked Diego.

"I don't know but it has a lot of corpses around, could be murder or suicide, we've yet to know."

"Well son of a bitch..."

"Gotta love the tourist spots eh?" joked Fred. "All the walls painted in blood and brains!"

"Screw you Fred!" exclaimed Diego.

"Alright lock it down, both of you!" said Sarah.

The team was then approached by a man accompanied by 2 men in security armour.

"Are you Raptor team?" asked the man.

"Yes sir! We're Raptor team!" I said. "I'm Lieutenant Roy, this is my team, Sergeant Sarah, Sergeant Diego, Corporal Fred and Private Lars."

"Glad you're here! We could use the hand!" said the man as he shook my hand. "I'm Captain Gerald! Goliath Security Division! Come with me! We'll fill you in as we make our way to the crime scene!"

"Yes sir! Raptor move out!"

"SIR!" said the squad in unison.

We followed the captain to board a police van and we were debriefed on what's been going on in Goliath station. As we were on the way to the scene, we had to pass through a series of security check points.

"Tight security eh Captain?" said Sarah.

"Yeah! Goliath station's been gone to shit now a days, about 70% of the station have been quarantined." Explained the captain.

"What?! More than 50% of the station?!"

"Yeah! It started off as 20%! That was only last month! Look at how much it has grown! We'd mind as well abandon station! But we have orders to stay and hold the line as Earth Gov sends reinforcements! In any case, meaning you people! I hope you guys are as good as they say!"

"Mainly terrorist threats sir! Of course that's what else could it be?" said Diego.

"You'll know when we get there... But one thing's for sure, we can't handle it anymore. Aside from unitologists, I suspect there's something else here."

"What do you mean sir?" I asked.

"It could be..."

"We're arrived sir!" said the driver.

"Alright..." said the Captain as he took a deep breath.

"What is it sir?" I asked.

"The moment I open those doors, well, I just hope you guys didn't have lunch."

The team looked at each other in confusion as the captain then proceeded to open the door of the van. As we stepped out of the vehicle, well, let's just say it's nothing anyone would want to see.

"HOLY SHIT!" shouted Diego.

"I-I-I can't take this... I'm going to throw up" said Lars as he held his hand on his mouth.

"What the hell..." I said.

Here I thought looking at the descriptions and photos in report cases were bad enough, but to actually see it for myself. There are bodies all over the place, with their blood staining every bit of the floor, and even on the walls. Just by looking at the bodies, I can't even identify who's who, as if someone blew their faces out with a shotgun. There are even severed body parts lying all over the place. This really confirms the gruesome reports that have been very common recently, to see it for myself, I feel like I'm in hell.

"Welcome to the dead zones of Goliath station..." said the captain. "At least... one of them."

"T-There's more than one?!" I exclaimed. "Aw hell, we're in for a load of shit today guys."


	2. Chapter 2: Nothing but blood and meat

Upon looking at the bloody scene, we just couldn't believe our eyes, even though there were reports, I didn't think we'd encounter one so soon, but then again we're supposed to be special forces. Private Lars apparently didn't exactly have the stomach for this, and he threw up in a trash bin near-by.

"Ah hell..." said Lars as he held his mouth.

"Get it together!" I exclaimed.

"Somehow I think this is just the beginning." Said Diego.

"Sorry to say Lieutenant..." said Captain Gerald. "But as I've said, this is one of the dead zones, there are more areas but we lack the man power to deploy troops to other sectors, we have our hands full at the moment."

"Any and every area after the checkpoint we crossed earlier is considered quarantine am I correct?" I asked.

"I'm afraid that's an affirmative." Sighed the Captain.

"Doesn't Titan Station have security feeds and such we can refer to?"

"We do but, it's deeper into the quarantine zone, we've lost contact with forces there."

"What do you mean lost contact?" asked Sarah.

"Maybe you should hear this." Said the Captain as he accessed his rig for an audio recording.

"This is Goliath Security Division Sector 7!" shouted a man in the recording. "We are under attack! We need reinforceme... No! No! They're here! GAAHH! AAAARRGGGHHHH!"

The recording then ended in static noise, doesn't look like Sector 7 stood a chance. Although I found it odd, in the recording, there was no sound of gun fire or anything of the sort. Silencers maybe? I have no idea at the moment.

"Unitologist attack?" asked Lars.

"Possible." Replied the Captain.

"I find it odd sir, if it was a unitologists terrorist attack, there would've been the sound of gun fire in that recording." I added. "Troopers in the base couldn't even get to counter attack, unless they were all unarmed?"

"You think it could be like what happened in Titan Station?" said Fred. "A necromorph out break?"

"That's impossible!" said the Captain. "The Marker test lab is secured and under lock down at the moment, it's technically out of the quarantine zone and is under heavy security."

"Well then I think our terrorists are pretty much melee combatants, at least that's one thing I can think of."

"Well we're getting nowhere, and I don't think we can find out what's going on with any of the crime scenes without accessing that security footage." Said Sarah. "Whether this be murder or suicide, I don't think there's much clues we can find aside from blood, blood and more blood."

"She has a point." Said Diego. "We'd be able to find out what happened with every single scene at once."

"I'm with you on that idea but..." sighed the Captain. "I sent 3 squads to Sector 7, none of them came back, no comms, no nothing, they just disappeared."

"Then we'd better get moving." I said. "Alright, everyone back into..."

Just before I could finish, I spotted a few people standing on the rooftops holding a rocket launcher. And I highly doubt they were here to talk or help us, they were confirmed hostiles.

"EVERYONE GET DOWN!" I yelled.

The terrorist then fired a rocket at our transport, it blew up and killed the two security officers standing by it.

"ONE MIND ONE BODY!" Shouted the terrorist.

"Aww great!" Diego complained as he crawled to the nearest cover he could find. "Unitologists!"

"I count 8 hostiles on the rooftops!" said Sarah as she loaded her gun.

"Raptor team! Helmets up and return fire!" I shouted.

The team then proceeded to combat mode as their helmets unfolded. But from the looks of things, we have the disadvantage, hostiles have the higher ground, and we're sitting ducks here. Thankfully our armour grade was higher, we're able to withstand a few bullets, and from the looks of the terrorists, they have nothing but cloth. Although we're somewhat bulletproof, I'd rather not risk standing out depending on our armour too much.

"FRED!" I shouted. "Pop smoke! I've got an idea!"

"Roger!" replied Fred. "Deploying smoke!"

Fred threw a smoke grenade and hid back into cover, in a manner of seconds, the whole area was covered in smoke, we were out of the terrorists visual.

"I can't see a thing!" shouted one of the terrorists.

"Just keep firing! They're in there somewhere and they can't move unless we have them pinned down!" said another terrorist.

Our team couldn't see a thing, so we switched our helmet visors to thermal vision. We have a visual advantage but we're still pinned down. Their aim is off from the smoke, but a stray bullet just might hit us still.

"Sarah! Deploy your DAT!" I yelled.

"Copy that!" Sarah replied.

DAT, otherwise known as Defensive Automated Turret, was one of Sarah's later inventions. It's as small as a grenade, but it can unfold and be deployed to fire lead ammunition as well as a few grenade rounds.

"DAT Deployed! Firing grenade rounds!"

The DAT then fired a number of grenade rounds, causing the terrorists to hide back into cover and stop firing.

"Raptor team on me!" I whispered into the helmet radio. "Sarah keep the DAT on automated fire, we're going to enter this building and head for the rooftop, they'll never see it coming."

"Good idea!" said the Captain. "Let's move then!"

I lead my team and the Captain into the nearest building, since there was smoke and the terrorists were pinned down, they couldn't see where we went and would assume we were still stuck, or thinking the DAT was us returning fire. After some time, apparently the DAT ran out of ammunition and the terrorists returned fire with another rocket. The explosion cleared and they realize that we weren't there anymore.

"WHAT?!" shouted one of the terrorists. "Where did they..."

Before he could finish, a round object just dropped right in front of his face.

"What the hell is this?" said the terrorist as he investigated the object. "Oh shit..."

"Say goodnight bitch!" yelled Fred.

The object the terrorist grabbed was a grenade, modified to the size of a ping pong ball, rather than the standard grenade canister. Fred loved to make those since it's smaller and more compact, enabling him to carry more, as well as it brings hostiles to confusion.

The grenade then exploded catching 4 others along with it in the blast radius. The terrorist holding the grenade, well, he disappeared into a red mist of blood and meat. The other surviving terrorists tried to return fire, but we had them first.

"Open fire but none lethal shots, disarm them. We'll want to interrogate them." I said.

The team then open fired and managed to successfully knock them down and disarming them. Now that they're down, we proceeded to their location. There I find the corpses of the dead terrorists, and the survivors struggling on the floor, growling in pain. One of them had an arm shot off, and I turned to Diego.

"What?" said Diego. "You said disarm them!"

I sighed and ordered Diego, Lars and Fred to secure the perimeter.

"There might be more of them, keep your guns up!" I said.

I notice one of the terrorists trying to crawl away, as I notice he's been wounded with multiple shots to the leg, but from the looks of it, he's going to bleed to death pretty soon. I walked towards him and tried to get his attention.

"Hey!" I said.

The terrorist ignored me and kept trying to crawl away.

"You're not going to get very far in your condition."

Still, the terrorist ignored me, so I thought I'd take a different approach. I walked towards him and stepped on one of the bullet wounds and pressed it hard. He then started crying and growling in pain.

"Now that I have your attention." I smirked. "Mind telling us what the flying fuck are you trying to do?!"

"Go to hell!" he replied as he spat blood on my armour.

"Say again?" I said as I stepped harder on the bullet wound.

I then noticed on his shoulder, a patch design of the marker. This confirmed that unitologists are the ones behind the recent attacks.

"Great..." said Sarah. "Never thought a church could be a terrorist community."

"You're all going to die..." said the terrorist as he starts to shut his eyes.

"Hey I'm not done with you!" I said.

"LIEUTENANT!" shouted the Captain.

I turned to see what was going on, and apparently the surviving terrorists pulled out a pistol, I readied my rifle but then it turns out they weren't going to attack us.

"ONE MIND ONE BODY!" they shouted in unison as they put the pistols to their heads.

"Wait NO!" Sarah shouted.

But it was too late, each of the surviving terrorists blew their brains out. I turned to the previous terrorist I was investigating and I noticed he was just laying still. I checked his pulse only to find out that he bled to death.

"Ah shit." I said as my helmet unfolded.

"We've got to keep moving." Said Diego.

"Yeah but we're prone to more terrorist attacks if we walk in the open!"

"There's service tunnels that lead towards Sector 7, we can try those." Said the Captain.

"Alright sounds good, lead on Captain." I said.

"Right this way... ugh!"

"What is it? I said.

I noticed the Captain just froze on the spot as he looked down from the rooftops. I investigated what he was looking at and just so happens I myself froze in shock.

"Sir... the bodies in the crime scene..." said Lars.

"How the hell..." added Sarah.

"Impossible." I said as shook my head. "Where are they?!"

When we first arrived in the crime scene, there was nothing but corpses everywhere, the floor and walls were decorated with blood. Everything was pretty much the same, only that, this time the bodies were all gone.


	3. Chapter 3: Bloody Darkness

Goliath station is a lot more mysterious than I thought, not to mention creepy. Everywhere we went, blood decorated the walls and floor. Captain Gerald lead us to the service tunnels so that we could avoid further complications along the way, we have no idea how many there are, and with our numbers, we could easily be outnumbered and outgunned. The service tunnels should ease our travels towards the security tower in sector 7.

Once we reached the tunnels, I thought it may have been a smooth sail towards sector 7, but turns out we're in for one hell of a ride.

"Come on this way." Said Captain Gerald as he opened the door to the service tunnel.

"Ugh..." complained Fred waving his hand in front of his face. "What's that smell? Thought you said it was a service tunnel, not a sewer!"

"It isn't! But I can't see a thing in here!"

Apparently the power was out, so the service tunnels was pitch black and impossible to see with the naked eye. I handed the Captain a flash light since he isn't exactly geared up like us in Raptor team.

"Sir, take this." I said as I handed him a flash light.

"Ah thank you." He replied.

The moment he turned it on, he froze.

"What in the world..." said Sarah.

The Captain shone the light down the tunnel, and it turns outs that the city upstairs was the only place filled with blood. Even in the service tunnels, there were mutilated bodies everywhere.

"You doing ok rookie?" asked Diego.

"I... I don't know..." he replied, breathing heavily.

"This... this is just wrong..."

"What could have done this?"

"Captain." I said. "Are you sure the marker test lab is secure?"

"Yes it is!" he replied. "Up until now it's safe and secured! All activities have been ceased to be safe!"

"No other marker test labs within the quarantine zone?!"

"No! 2 marker test labs in a single station? That's too dangerous! You're not suggesting there's a necromorph outbreak in Goliath?!"

"These bodies seem to suggest that sir." added Fred. "There's no gunshot wounds in any of them, plus no gun I know could do this damage."

"I ... I don't know..." shivered the Captain. "I..."

Before the Captain could finish, we heard a scream down the tunnel.

"What was that?!" panicked Lars.

"Trouble..." said Diego.

"Let's move Raptor!" I shouted.

We rushed to where we heard the scream, it sounded like this person was being chased. Eventually it got louder and louder, and the tone of the voice suggested terror and horror.

"NO! GET AWAY! NOOOO!" shouted the voice.

We turned into a corner and we found the man giving out the scream, he was being pummelled by another man.

"FREEZE!" I shouted as we raised our guns and shone our flashlights. "What the hell..."

Apparently it wasn't a man pummelling the victim, it had a human body structure but it was something I've never seen before, nor was it in any of the files of necromorph variations. I couldn't even tell if it was a necromorph, but it definitely wasn't human. The creature turned around and reacted violently to the light we shone, it was so skinny to the point you can see the bones, lower torso's been ripped open and exposed, limbs were filled with blood and looked mutated and grotesque, bones were even popping out of its skin. And its face, the jaw was opened so wide that no human could ever pull off, the nose was missing and the eyes, it's like they weren't even there anymore, the skin around it was rotten to the point you could see the eye sockets.

Unfortunately, this thing killed the man by pulling out his organs from his stomach, the poor man didn't stand a chance. Before we could open fire, that thing leaped away and disappeared into the ventilation ducts.

"W-what the hell was that?!" shouted Lars.

"Was that a necromorph?!" added Sarah.

"Keep it together Raptor team!" I said. "One at a time! Fred Diego, Lars, secure the area! We're going to find out what we're dealing with here. Sarah, Captain, check the victim, I'm going to call this in."

Sarah and the Captain investigated the man, unfortunately he was dead, but from his injuries, who wouldn't have died from that. They identified the man and it turns out he was a police officer in sector 7.

"Ben Tyson." Said the Captain. "I know this man, I was his commander when he was still in basic."

"Oh." Said Sarah. "I'm so sorry to hear that."

"Good man he is... God bless his soul."

I tried to call this in but apparently the signal is being interfered with by the tunnels itself.

"Piece of shit..." I complained.

"Sir." Said Sarah. "Come on, we've got to get moving."

"Yeah I guess so, alright, let's move out."

"What about the body?" asked Diego.

"Explain."

"We can't just leave him here, that thing might come back for him."

"Well we can't help him now, no one could've survived those injuries."

"Yeah but, it doesn't seem right, leaving him here only for those things to come back."

"He'll slow us down then. We're leaving him."

"I... yes sir."

"We're moving out! Keep your guns at the ready! Safeties off!"

"Yes sir!" they shouted in unison.

We carefully proceeded deeper into the tunnels, everywhere we go, mutilated bodies were all over like trash. I'm already starting to be convinced that this is a necromorph outbreak. The disappearing bodies, and now this thing, it looked nothing like a necromorph, but the possibility of a new species. The whole thing is still a mystery though, the marker test lab here is secured and there's no sign of an outbreak. Something else is going on here, and I know for sure, my team and I, are not prepared for it.

It has been a whole hour and a half since we saw that thing, and we've encountered nothing but blood and bodies so far, but we're nearing the security tower in sector 7.

"Once we reach the tower, we need to initiate the WAR protocol." Said the Captain.

"WAR protocol?" I asked.

"It locks down the entire base, making it somewhat a fortress, windows and doors will be reinforced with 10-inches of pure steel and complimented by a plasma coating."

"I guess nothing will get in or out in that case, well that'd be a good thing to do in case of any attacks." Said Sarah.

"Fair enough." I replied.

As we walked further and further into the tunnels, I felt quite uneasy. We only saw that one thing kill a man a few hours back but I'm getting a strong feeling we're being watched. I know we're not alone in here but what is watching us.

"Lieutenant." Said Fred as he pointed to a door in a distance. "Sector 7 security tower! That must be the basement door!"

"About damn time!" said Diego.

"Alright, once we're in, we clear the area one level at a time and initiate the war protocol." I replied. "Captain, we made it!... Captain?"

I turned around to look at the Captain, but it turns out he disappeared.

"What the? Where did he go?!" exclaimed Sarah.

The team shone their lights in multiple directions looking for Captain Gerald, but could not figure out where he is. Well at least until we found his flashlight.

"Sir!" said Lars as he picked up a flash light. "Wasn't this the flashlight you lent the Captain?"

I inspected it, and apparently it was the same one I lent the Captain. Now this is creepy, I swear he was right behind us not too long ago, he couldn't have wondered off on his own, but then again the flashlight, he can't exactly see in the dark without one.

Next thing I knew, I heard a scream, we shone our flashlights to the direction to where we heard it, and we saw that thing again. It reacted violently and tosses something roughly round at Diego.

"Ugh it's throwing rocks now?!" he complained. "Wait... that didn't feel like a rock."

"What?" asked Fred.

Diego shone his light at the object the creature threw at him.

"HOLY SHIT!" he shouted as he took a few steps back. "IT'S ... IT'S..."

I turned around to investigate what the hell it was, and low and behold, it was the head of Captain Gerald, he had been taken while we weren't looking probably. I turned back to that thing and it turns out that it wasn't alone, it was accompanied by a lot more of those things, I didn't have to count, but we were out numbered.

"Pull back!" I shouted.

"What?! We can take them!" complained Fred.

"We're at a disadvantage! We'll be surrounded! Run for the door! MOVE!"

"Son of a bitch!"

We ran towards the door as fast as we could, returned fire as we peeled our way. But every time we kill one, it's as if 3 more take its place, they're coming in like a bloody mob. They were catching up but we made it to the door. We entered and tried to slam the door shut, but some of those things managed to block the door from closing.

"EAT SHIT AND DIE!" shouted Sarah as she shot those who were blocking the door.

"Come on! Push!" I shouted as Diego, Lars and I tried to push the door shut.

After some struggle, we drove them back and managed to slam the door shut.

"Holy shit..." said Diego, trying to catch his breath. "There was so many of them!

We can still hear those things banging on the door, but it seems to be holding out, and I doubt they'd be getting in any time soon, we still need to put the tower under WAR protocol.

"Freeze!" shouted a voice from upstairs.

I turned my head towards where I heard the voices, and I saw two men in security suits pointing rifles at us. The team and I reacted by doing the same action with ours.

"Drop your guns!" shouted the first man.

"There's 5 of us, and 2 of you. " I replied. "You sure you want to see this through?"

"Damn it..." said the second man. "Are you unitologists?!"

"What? Yeah sure we are!" said Diego sarcastically.

"Bloody hell! We're Earth Gov. Spec Ops! For the last time lower your guns!" I added.

"Earth Gov.?" Said the first man as he lowered his rifle. "You could've said so in the first place!"

"Dude are you sure that's a good idea?" asked the second man. "What if they're disguised?"

"If they were unitologists we'd be dead by now. They don't usually negotiate anyway."

"Fair enough." Said the second man as he lowered his rifle.

I thought there was going to be more trouble, lucky both sides lowered their guns.

"Identify yourselves." I said.

"Sector 7 security officers. " said the first man. "I'm Corporal Matthias Kendron, this is my partner Corporal Kiel Fieldron."

"Better come with us, it's not exactly safe here." Said Kiel.

I agreed as they lead us out of the basement of the tower. At least the team can catch their breaths and get their heads together for now. Whatever's going on here, where ever we go, it's all blood and chaos, and I get the strong feeling we're right in the middle of the whole damn thing.


	4. Chapter 4: Lockdown

Kiel and Matthias led us into a safe room in the upper levels. From the looks of it, the whole place has been on lock down, blast shields on windows have been deployed, and laser walls block every door that can be deactivated with proper authorization. Even the ventilation systems had been blocked with lasers, no one would be able to get in or out.

We entered the safe room as Kiel reactivated the laser door behind us, from there we noticed that the safe room was apparently just the right place we needed to be, the main hub where we get to access security feeds and CCTV footage. We also saw a handful of survivors, maybe about ten or so. All of them had the same frightened look on their faces, but then again, in something like this, who wouldn't.

"So..." said Kiel "Welcome to Sector 7 I guess... Or what's left of it."

"Just so happens your safe room is our objective." I said.

"Pardon?"

"Sarah, Lars, you know what to do."

"Yes sir!" said Lars and Sarah.

Lars and Sarah then proceeded to the nearby consoles to begin their search for the footage we're looking for.

"What's going on here?" asked Matthias.

"Sorry mate but what we do here is classified." Said Diego.

"Classified?! You mean you're not here to rescue us or anything?!"

"Do we look like a rescue squad to you?"

"Alright stand down Diego." I said as my helmet unfolded. "What he says is true, our mission is not your rescue, or anyone's in fact."

"But how can that be?!" complained a survivor.

"In the first place we didn't even know that there were survivors to begin with, plus it was assumed that everyone here was killed."

"The hell gave you guys that idea?!" asked Matthias.

"This." I said as I replayed that same distress audio log that Captain Gerald had.

"Holy shit... Was that Glenn?" said a female survivor. "Oh my God... No..."

From the tone of that person's voice, apparently she recognized the voice in the recording.

"Aw shit..." said Kiel.

"What is it?" asked Fred.

"We couldn't know for sure, but we sent people to the watch tower upstairs to send out a distress signal. We thought they were alive and held up somewhere... I... I didn't realize they didn't make it."

"I'm sorry." Said Diego.

"Lieutenant!" said Sarah. "We need to talk."

"Alright." I replied. "Diego, Fred... Tend to the injured if there are any, see what info you can gather from these people."

"Copy that sir." Said Fred.

"Go easy on them, I think some are traumatized, tend to the injured if there are any."

I then proceeded to Sarah in some corner of the room.

"Sir, something's wrong here." Whispered Sarah.

"What is it?" I replied.

"The data, footage, basically everything... It's all gone."

"What about back up data? Archives? Nothing?"

"Negative, the whole thing has been wiped clean, reformatted."

"Maybe the survivors know something, keep at it, I'll see what I can dig up."

"Alright you do that."

I found it weird, why was all the data and archives purged from the system. In the first place why was it purged? This sector has been active for a few years from the looks of it, everything since day one has been wiped out. This is getting more complicated than I thought. I then proceeded and stood in front of the survivors.

"All of you worked here in the tower yes?" I asked.

They were all silent, but they nodded their heads in unison.

"Before... all this happened, were you people experiencing problems and such in here?"

"What kind?" asked another female survivor.

"Anything out of the ordinary."

"Well..." she said. "Nothing much, but our consoles lagged like crazy for a few hours, then power fluctuated a lot."

"Has it ever happened before?"

"N-No... this was the first time... Oh my God, you're not suggesting this was a cyber attack?"

"That's actually a possibility."

"But who would ..."

"Unitologists most likely..." interrupted Matthias.

"What makes you so sure?" I asked.

"They've been causing all the shit lately around town."

"Yeah." added Kiel. "Thanks to them, I lost my whole family!"

"Lost?" I asked.

"Yeah! Some religious bullshit about the being the next step in evolution and giving our bodies!"

"Your family were unitologists?"

"Yeah bloody religious too!"

"Alright Kiel..." said Matthias as he tapped him on the shoulder. "Look, long story short, his family were victims in... whatever that was going on there."

"My condolences." I said. "I wonder though."

"What?"

"This whole place is in lock down, from the inside it's relatively safe with the lasers and such, but why is everyone held up in a CCTV room?"

Before I was about to throw in my next question, I started hearing a faint scratching noise.

"Wait..." I whispered.

"Huh?" asked Kiel.

"SSHH! Listen!"

Everyone in the room kept silent as we heard the scratching noises coming from just outside the room. And then the scratching got louder and more frequent, I thought it was just one, but I assumed there be more judging from the multiple footsteps I'm also listening to. I signalled Raptor team to take defensive positions and try to identify what's outside.

"Diego." I whispered as my helmet folded up. "Possible tangos just outside the room, lay low but cover the door way."

"Why don't we just take them out?" he replied.

"Possible that it's those things we encountered in the tunnels earlier."

"They broke through the door in the basement?! But that door was reinforced!"

"They didn't..." said Kiel. "There's more of them in the tower."

"What?"

"Shh!" I said. "Lars... Use the console to give us a view on what's outside this door."

Lars then nodded in agreement as he tried to access the CCTV functions. The scratching on the walls and multiple footsteps got me really nervous for what was about to come. I still can remember what they look like though, bloody look of terror, and they ripped out the head of Captain Gerald, poor man. My breathing was getting a bit heavy due to adrenaline, and I won't hide that fear is also coming into play here. This is a new kind of enemy and despite knowing reports of necromorphs, monsters and such, I've still limited exposure to these kinds of scenarios, I'm going to play it safe for now until I understand what's going on.

"Sir..." whispered Lars as he signalled for me to go to him.

Lars showed me live footage of what was just standing outside the door. I was right, it was those things from the tunnels, only that they weren't the same ones, there were more in the building. Just outside this room is practically a whole swarm already.

"Aw hell." Whispered Matthias.

"They don't know we're in here yet," said Sarah. "Just be silent for a bit."

I noticed that some of the survivors are shivering in fear, putting their hands together and trying to control their breathing.

"Sir." Whispered Lars. "Look..."

Lars points into the video footage as he saw an armed man just walking by very near their position.

"Sir another survivor, but he doesn't know that those..."

"Shhh..." I interrupted.

"But..."

When Lars turned back into the video footage, he witnessed that the man just turned into the corner and spotted all those things lurking outside.

"Oh shit.." he said.

From the footage, we saw that those creatures spotted him almost immediately when he spoke. They gave out a fearful shriek as and gave chase to the man. The man open fired at the creatures but after a while, decided to turn and run. Unfortunately one of those things pounced onto him and knocked him down to the floor.

"NO NO NO!" shouted the man.

I couldn't bear to watch it anymore, let alone listen to it. Unfortunately I can still hear those creatures screaming and the man crying out in pain as they were feasting on him alive and ripping him limb from limb.

Kiel and Matthias wanted to open the door and help the man, but Sarah and I stopped them both.

"What are you doing?!" complained Matthias.

"We have to help him!" added Kiel.

"Quiet!" I said as I covered both their mouths. "We will die if we help him! I'm sorry but we have no choice, he's a dead man now."

Matthias then kept struggling in disagreement, insisting that we help the man. In the first place how can we, he's already being ripped to shreds. If we are to avoid that same outcome, we have to remain silent the while time the horror outside is going on.

The screaming kept going on and on, the man was still alive despite being ripped all over. I felt really uneasy, but what other choice do we have. We go out, we're screwed, even if we maybe somehow survive, the casualties might be high, I don't know if we have the firepower to stop that many in one go. There was just too many to count off. Whatever's going on here, we'd better put a stop to it very soon.


End file.
